Sometimes, a Quiet Time

Sometimes you have to get quiet and listen to the sound of your soul breathing.

Earlier today, I was reminded of a recent, lengthy and very challenging period in my life. During that time, I discovered there were many people in my life who were untrustworthy, and I felt stung by their deceitful behavior.

It can be crazy-making to be in a situation where you repeatedly face frequent criticism and back-stabbing. I'm grateful to have left that environment, and disappointed to discover that the environment has not fully left me.
The reminder today caused a lot of bitterness to float to the surface of my consciousness.

The effects of poisoning do not always dissipate when the poison is removed. It will take time and effort to genuinely get past what I experienced, especially since I am only now realizing how deep the wounds ran.

So, what do we do when we are in that position?

We grieve. We grieve the potential that was never realized, the friendships that were not really there, the dark motives that greed creates; we grieve it all.

Some people think my choice to follow Jesus as my Savior is a shallow and foolish decision. They see Him as a teacher, a prophet, and a wise man, but they don't feel a need to see Him as or have a Savior. They are independent and capable of addressing God on their own, and they view me as less evolved because I rely upon my Lord.

I may indeed be less evolved. In fact, I would go so far as to say I am broken. In some theologies or cosmologies or philosophies, that is tantamount to heresy. We are not broken, we are perfect!

I don't know. I don't feel so perfect. If you feel that way, I'm happy for you.

I just feel human, and in my humanness today I have felt a bit blue.

Jesus says to me, "I know how it feels. You hear the same people who cheered you one week shouting the next week for Barabbas's release and your crucifixion."

Jesus did this extraordinary thing. In the middle of that crucifixion and torturous death sentence, He forgave his enemies. Forgave them! Proclaimed them ignorant of what they were doing.

I'm not there. I'm not ready to forgive people who have hurt me for their hypocrisy and their love of being a bully. I'd like to say I can and have, but then, today, the emotional acid reflux gets triggered by a simple comment and I know I have not done it.

That inability to love is my shortcoming in the deal. I have been on both sides of the coin. I have been the hateful, hypocritical person, and I have been the unsuspecting victim. I don't know how to resolve it from either side.

All I can do is nail my part to the cross, nail their part on the other side, and go through Jesus to find that reconciling place. My friends who don't need a Messiah have other approaches, but this is the only one I've found that I can return to time and again. It is bloody, dirty, messy, dusty and chaotic on my side of the cross. It isn't scripted or pretty, and I am bloody, dirty, messy, dusty and chaotic because I am caught up in the situation.

Yet, once I have nailed it in place, accepted my own messiness, and trusted that Jesus can reconcile it somehow, the world stops moving, the storm stops raging, the shouting grows quiet, and a peace I cannot understand begins to fill me. All of the sounds fall away, the raging, the crying, the accusations and counter-accusations, the anger, the sarcasm, the lies, all of it just fades to silence.

And in that silence I hear the sound of my soul's breath, the steady thrum of my soul's heartbeat, the eternal quiet of love.

I don't know what is happening on the other side of the cross. I have been drawn into the heart of Jesus, the Sacred Heart. From there, the pain and sorrow are silenced, and I float within an embryonic peace. In my woundedness, I have entered into the heart of God through God's own wound.

I clamor for justice, I shout for recognition, I gather witnesses to my own righteousness, I cry and rend my garments. I want balance restored, and by that I mean, I want to be the one on top.

When my woundedness finally leads me to enter that Sacred Wound, I discover what I really want is calm. I want to feel loved, that's all.

I'm grateful to have my Wounded God. God dared to be vulnerable to us by giving us free will.

So I run to the wounds, to the place where I can slip inside God in my brokenness.

There, in the quiet, I hear my soul begin to breathe.

A Simple Statement on the Bombings at the Boston Marathon

We have options when responding to a violent act. One is the natural one, to turn toward animosity. The other is the supernatural one, to turn toward love.

We have an amazing power at our disposal in the linking of prayers for those who have been affected, that they may find consolation and healing. We pray for those who are trying to solve this crime, that they are one with the mind of wisdom and that anyone with knowledge about it is given the courage to come forward to them. And we pray for those who would perpetrate such crimes, that their minds, hearts and souls may receive the grace they need to return to love.

As a marathoner, this atrocity hit home in an unexpected way. For the sake of the running community, I am filling my heart with as much love as possible in order to let it pour forth into a thirsty world.

Pace et bene,
David +

"Right Now" - Bright Light Parade

I was mowing the lawn, minding my own business, listening to my mp3 player (yes, I am a dinosaur who does not own an iPod), when the song "Right Now" by Bright Light Parade began to play.

I was captivated by the lyric, "I've realized there's more to life than hiding from what's inside."

In the context of the song, it speaks to allowing myself to express my love for God without concern for the opinion of others, to quit covering that up or excusing it.

None of us get there without first admitting what's inside that blocks this free expression.

Maybe we call it the Shadow, or Original Sin, or Illusion. I don't care what we call it, just that we see it.

There is a Me that I live with every day, and a Me that I want people to think I am. Like St. Paul, I say, "I want to do what is good, but I don't. I don't want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway." (Romans 7:19, New Living Translation [NLT])

So it is and so it will be as long as I do not invite God into that part of me. This is part of human nature. Scarecly a few passages into the Hebrew Bible, people are beginning to try to hide things from God. We read about Adam, "Then the LORD God called to the man, 'Where are you?' He replied, 'I heard you walking in the garden, so I hid. I was afraid because I was naked.'" (Genesis 3:9-10, NLT)

What a great cosmic joke it is for us to say God is all-seeing, all-knowing, and ever-present, and yet to think we could hide our nakedness, our realness, from God. God seems to play along, asking, "Where are you?" like a parent playing hide and seek with a child who covers his eyes thinking if he cannot see, he cannot be seen.

God has already seen our nakedness.

So, no more hiding what's inside. No more trying to cover up, medicate, numb, or compartmentalize it all away from God. We build a fortress of behavior and pretense around our weaknesses, which only locks us inside with them. No more pretending it doesn't exist! My part in the human experience is well-established. I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I am flawed.

When I quit hiding from that fact, I can begin to allow God to see it, too, and healing can begin. I can tear down that fortress, but it can only be done from the inside.

"I've realized there's more to life than hiding from what's inside."

Pace e bene,
David +

Love and the Crazy Train

I’ve been contemplating lately our tendency – my tendency – to feel the need to assign blame, to hold resentments, to understand another person’s inexplicable actions. What is the attraction? And does someone else’s severe act excuse mine if it is a lesser one?

I grew up being sexually assaulted for much of my childhood. Looking at myself as a child undergoing these things, it is easy to differentiate between perpetrator and victim. I can also look at ways I “acted out” as an adult that can be traced back to the lingering damage from these repeated assaults, the way it “set me up” to fail. . Looking at myself as a child undergoing these things, it is easy to differentiate between perpetrator and victim. I can also look at ways I “acted out” as an adult that can be traced back to the lingering damage from these repeated assaults, the way it “set me up” to fail.

There came a time in life, though, when I had to take responsibility for my participation in actions that I knew were wrong but chose to join. I’m not talking about being abused as a child, I’m talking about going along later in life when someone suggested doing something I know is wrong. At times, I was easily coerced into misbehavior because of my childhood experiences and the lack of boundaries they left, but I permitted that coercion to be effective even though I knew what I would do would be against my moral code. Then, I tried to blame them for “talking me into it.” They might have suggested it, but I talked me into it. What do I do with that?

Why try to comprehend the incomprehensible? It is like trying to understand why my friend in Florida turned out to be a serial killer, or why a friend’s 9 year-old grandson was brutally murdered last week by blunt-force trauma when his father apparently beat him with an axe while the boy slept.

I don’t know why a father would rape his son. I don’t know why priests would hold a sexual black mass while assaulting a kindergartner. I don’t know why a lot of things happen in this life. I just know they don’t all happen to me, thank God! It only feels like that sometimes.

This is my slice of the pie, my thread of the DNA of self-destructive behavior that we inherit as children of Adam and Eve. This, to me, is what Original Sin is all about, our nonsensical desire to destroy what should sustain us. We do it to each other as individuals, we do it family to family, city to city, society to society, and as a mass we do it to the very world that gives us life. We riot by setting fire to our own neighborhoods and burning down our neighbors’ businesses. We celebrate league championships by overturning cars and looting merchants.

Humankind has got a crazy streak as long as history can record. Adam and Eve were rebellious. Cain killed Abel. It appears that scripture infers that one of Noah’s sons had sex with him when Noah was drunk. Lot’s daughters got him drunk and had sex with him. David committed adultery with Bathsheba and murdered her husband, and history calls him a great king who was the apple of God’s eye. What the heck is THAT all about? Really? Victims get punished, the evil go free. I’m telling you, it’s crazy, and nothing will make a person as crazy as trying to make logic out of crazy behavior!

The Bible is not afraid of the crazy. It puts it right out there. “Look, there are a few righteous people who show up,” it says, “but even a lot of them are nuts from time to time if not always.” Abraham gets the son he always wanted and then is convinced God has instructed him to kill the boy. There weren’t radios at the time that Abraham could say were the source of the instructions he heard. What if Abraham was schizophrenic and delusional? He could still be a man of faith, he could still be the father of many nations, he could still have his good points. But he could also have his psychotic break.

What if the true story is that Abraham didn’t really hear God right at all? What if he had a lot of stress? He was old, he was cracking up, he heard God a couple of times accurately and then one time thought he heard God, but actually only heard his own moment of human craziness? What if the whole point of the story was not that God asked him to kill Isaac, but that God, seeing what he was about to do, distracted him and provided a ram to kill instead to satisfy Abraham’s blood-thirst? What if God were the life saver and not the life taker in this one?

Isn’t that as prototypical a foreshadowing of the Messiah as any other take on the story? God sees the misdirected blood-thirst that runs rampant in humanity, the need to accuse and blame and scapegoat and destroy, and God says, “If they have to kill somebody, I will let them kill Me, not each other. This has got to stop somehow.”

And then God resurrects, as if to say, “What is the point of all this killing? Death is an illusion. Turn from the greed and follow love!” But God is an optimist, however well-intentioned, and not everybody gets it.

Yet, a few do get it. Over the years, they catch on, they wake, they surrender all to love. And some grow old and are revered, and some die as martyrs; some are heard and some are misunderstood. They become saints and they become Gandhi and they become Martin Luther King, Jr., and they become Mother Teresa and they become Buddha and a million-million others over the centuries who make a conscious choice to no longer buy into the craziness that is human behavior. Maybe they become Jung, and maybe they become anonymous conscientious objectors and maybe they become Quakers.

As Bob Bennett wrote in his song, these are the people who become “Jesus in our time.” Humankind has a short memory. Yes, Santayana, we forget the past and continually repeat it. Every generation re-enacts the first one; every generation has their own version of crazy. And every generation has their counter-cultural souls who rise up in the name of love, who cherish and pursue and demonstrate love against all costs and any odds. The lesson is repeated in every generation.

It is not easy to be Jesus in our time, but it is a lot harder not to be. The cost of perpetuating craziness takes its toll on the perpetuator. The heart withers, the brain devolves, the body sickens, the psyche splits, the emotions disappear. Ethics fall away in favor of opportunity; rationalizations take the place of righteousness; accusations replace empathy. We create a culture of death, the death of others’ hopes and dreams and joy, the death of their bodies, the death of ourselves.

The rainforests are disappearing, yet we destroy more of them. We deny the dying that is all around us. Shocking videos of war scenes no longer bother us, but instead show up in gruesome reality in video games. We can watch commercials about dying children while we eat dinner. We speculate on what famous people did to deserve their deaths when they happen unexpectedly. We have lost our passion for life amid the overwhelming evidence of death.

I don’t think there is anything that stands opposed to death. It waits for all of us, so there is a level of acceptance to it that grows the more we see it. Death is merely the collateral damage to solving a problem. Hitler’s killing the Jews? The final solution. Wipe out two cities with atomic weapons? Solutions. Lynch a man because of his skin tone? A solution. Wipe out a rival clan? A solution. Euphemisms to keep us from noticing our consciences.

Again and again we are told by this culture of death that these things make sense, that killing is always justifiable, whether it is by active means or by withdrawing or withholding aid to a nation suffering from famine or genocide.

We long ago lost our sense of outrage. Cain and Abel should be a story that shocks us! Fratricide! Why doesn’t it shock us any more? Why do we teach it to our children as if Cain had decided to trick Abel in some prank? Why does this not outrage us, sadden us, surprise us?

We have long ago become immune to being shocked. We use murder as entertainment in most of our prime-time dramas, and many successful movies and games. Even ubiquitous family board games like Battleship or Clue trade on the unfelt reality of war or murder.

No, I don’t think resistance is the answer. The violence is overwhelmingly present, and Jesus saw this in its smallest forms. Matthew 5 holds some very strong sayings when it quotes Jesus in this way:

17“Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill.18“For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished. 19“Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

20“For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.

21“You have heard that the ancients were told, ‘You shall not commit murder’ and ‘Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court.’22“But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing,’ shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.23“Therefore if you are presenting your offering at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you,24leave your offering there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering.25“Make friends quickly with your opponent at law while you are with him on the way, so that your opponent may not hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the officer, and you be thrown into prison.26“Truly I say to you, you will not come out of there until you have paid up the last cent.

27“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery’;28but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.29“If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.30“If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell.”

The message is certainly shocking here, but what is the message? The message is that we all participate in the flawed system at one level or another and we need to realize it. If I have lusted after someone else’s mate, I am on that continuum of adultery whether I go further along it or not. I am part of the system. If I murder a reputation, I am on the continuum whether or not I murder a person. It is a call to wake up and see we are all somewhere in this system of craziness, if only by degree.

The only escape is to transform. If we allow love to transform us, we can begin to live according to a new system, a system Jesus identifies as the Kingdom of God. It is counter-intuitive.

Earlier in that same chapter are the Beattitudes. Here is their recounting:

1When Jesus saw the crowds, He went up on the mountain; and after He sat down, His disciples came to Him.2He opened His mouth and began to teach them, saying,

3“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

4“Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

5“Blessed are the gentle, for they shall inherit the earth.

6“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

7“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

8“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

9“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.

10“Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

11“Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.12“Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you."

The arrogant, the unfeeling, the harsh, the greedy, the opportunist, the judge, the rationalizer, the troublemaker and the selfish one are not part of that Kingdom of God. God is not excluding them, they are excluding themselves. It is the humble, the struggling, the gentle, the compassionate, the merciful, the loving, the peacemakers, and the disciples of love who are in the Kingdom, experiencing a different world than those around them. The Kingdom of Heaven is now; coexistent with the crazy train. We choose which camp we are going to call our home.

Some people are deeply involved in crazy, and some are at different points on the spectrum between sanity and craziness, between being compassionate and being a sociopath. The choice to love shakes up our status quo. It is not always - in fact, it is probably rarely - the first choice most of us make in response to encountering another person’s basic human craziness.

As long as I can say, “You are crazy and this is the proof!” I can separate you from me. I never have to say, “But, I am crazy, too, in my own way, or perhaps in the same way as you.”

If craziness is a spectrum, I’ve got my place on it. It’s not “on” or “off.” In the course of my life, if I have done crazy, senseless things, even one time, even to a minor degree, I’m on the spectrum. And, I have done crazy things, more than once, and more than to a minor degree. I have participated in the human condition of doing things that make no sense, and then thinking I am better than someone else who does something that makes no sense.

Feeling superior is not my way out of guilt or shame, it only helps me distance myself from those feelings of guilt and shame by stratifying the crime into felonies and misdemeanors, or into mortal and venial sins. It is a way to deny them, not resolve them. Jesus says such stratification is rationalization. A sin is a sin is a sin, and unless you are without one, as He says in the Gospel of John, 8:7, you have no right to judge another person for having their particular sin. Again and again, He says there are no levels. Just as Yoda says, “Do or not do. There is no try,” Jesus says, “Sin or not sin, there is no between.” In Matthew 7:3 He emphasizes this again, saying, “Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own?”

The decision to love moves us into a different way of life, eases and sometimes catapults us into a different way of looking at things.

I can spend years – and I have indeed personally spent decades – resenting wrongs perpetrated on me. I am not talking about somebody stealing my favorite pencil here, I am talking about the years of being raped as a child by people who abused their authority over me and the trust that I and others put in them by nature of their role in my life and our society.

These brutal and senseless acts caused a lot of damage, and I lived out of that damage for a long time, and acted out as a result of it time and time again. I took my place on the crazy train, and I spent years trying to parse out who my perpetrators were and to what degree my perpetrators were responsible for anything I did, and why they would do that in the first place.

I was superior to them because I did not rape children or even rape at all. But I was still dishonest, unreliable, uncaring and I broke hearts and disrespected people more than once as I moved through life convinced I was blameless because I was clinging to the innocence of my identification as a victim.

As long as I could ascribe it to the fault of my perpetrators, I didn’t see, or need to see, that I had my own brand of human crazy. I lived out of the basic defense of a child caught misbehaving who protests, “He did it first!” or the older adult child who gets caught for speeding and says, “But why are you arresting me instead of the guy who was passing me? Why didn’t you go for him? What he was doing was worse! It isn’t fair!”

The Apostle Paul writes in his letter to the Romans that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:22b). If we realize this, if we see this is what it means to participate in our little part of humanity’s craziness, no matter to what degree, we can find grounds for compassion and a reason for forgiveness.

I don’t believe forgiveness is facile, and it is not my intention to make forgiveness seem easy when the pain and grief we feel as a result of a grievous act is very real. Eventually, though, we either labor forever beneath the pain and the grief, or we forgive. We forge our own life, or live the life someone else seems to have assigned to us.

Yes, Virginia, I have my personal version of human craziness. If I am going to fully follow the path of love, I have to acknowledge this, forgive myself for those times when I acted out, and seek through love to not repeat them but instead to grow in compassion and thoughtfulness. If I fall back into the old patterns, as habit or addiction or ignorance or lack of awareness may cause, I need to repeat that forgiveness as many times as necessary. Not just seven times, as Jesus says in Matthew 18:22, “but seven times seventy times” Or, as we would say in modern parlance, not once or twice, but 100% of the time. There is no limit to forgiveness.

Likewise, I forgive my perpetrators. They too are part of the human tradition of crazy behavior, and regardless of the degree to which they demonstrate it, they are on the same spectrum as I am. If their offense is more severe than mine, I need to let that be a cause for my gratitude to have not injured another to the same degree. I need to see that as a grace in my life, not a point of superiority. When I do, when I see we are all in the same boat, and that hatred perpetuates and feeds the craziness while love forgives and frees me from its effects, why would I not forgive?

No, I don’t understand how someone could rape a child. Thank God that it makes no sense to me! And I don’t understand how people can beat and torture and kill one another. Thank God that it makes no sense to me! What I do understand all too well is my own experience of human imperfection, my own experience of letting a baser instinct blind me to a higher value, my own experience of the rush and thrill of disobedience, and the exhilarating power of destruction.

I can say, like Jesus, in the face of His horrendous treatment and crucifixion, “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do,” (Luke 23:24) and by doing so, enter right here and now into the Kingdom of Heaven, the realm of love. I can also sincerely say, “Father, forgive me, I didn’t realize what I was doing,” and begin to live out that Kingdom in the present world, become “Jesus for our time.”

If someone said to me, “Where would you rather live, in a place where love is the norm, or a place where destruction is the norm?” logically, I would choose the former. But when they add, “OK, then love, and you will live there beginning right now,” I start considering the price and whether or not it is too steep to pay. What?! No paybacks, no grudges, no resentments, no self-aggrandizement, no power trips, no excuses and rationalizations?!

Grace comes to every generation, every individual, every day, every moment, in every situation, and invites us to step out of the crazy life and into the life of love.

Because grace by its nature appears as an invitation, not a demand, the choice is up to us in that moment.

The Super Bowl and Making Meaning

I once considered myself a football fan. My band played tailgate parties for and got tickets to Tampa Bay Bucs games. I watched televised games with friends. I made bets with my sister whenever it was a Buckeyes/Gators game (and I won, won, won).

Maybe I have moved too often in the last few years to feel a regional loyalty. Maybe I can no more relate to watching millionaires play football against millionaires for the benefit of billionaires than I could relate to rich people playing polo. And it's not just football; I feel no connection to baseball, either, or basketball. Salaries, unions, disputes, lockouts, big business, corporate naming rights, teams deserting cities, increasing the number of games in a season and then breaking the records earned by players in shorter seasons; it just doesn't touch my life anymore, or my life doesn't touch it.

I believe Beyonce is a very talented singer, dancer and actress. However, there were no touchstones for me in her half-time performance. It's somebody else's demographic now, I suppose, and I need to release it all to 18 to 25 year-old males with disposable incomes and unshaped senses of discretion.

I'm not bitter about these changes. Professional team sports have passed me by. The parade is long over, and a few street sweepers push their brooms by me while I wonder what it was all about. That was the parade? Really?

Somewhere in Baltimore, vandalism will happen because their team won. Somewhere in San Francisco, vandalism will happen because their team lost. I've never understood this.

I salute the enthusiasm of those who are currently hoarse from screaming at players, refs, coaches and game plans for missed calls, blown coverage, and successful plays.

I'm not certain what has changed, but I don't feel like a participant anymore. I don't feel sad or depressed, just unplugged and disconnected from the National Zeitgeist.

Tomorrow morning I will enjoy a training run with friends as we gear up for a half-marathon that is a month distant. I will soak in the camaraderie of a few people who are not being paid millions to run, who have found in the expression of body, soul, heart and fellowship some deep source of joy.

It seems the less connected I become from capitalism and its artificial construct of who I am supposed to be, the happier I am. The fewer times that I pay attention to the messages telling me why I don't measure up, what I need to make-up for my deficits, what is required for me to be accepted and acceptable, the happier I am.

At this moment, I am led to consider The Gospel According to Matthew, chapter 6, verses 16-30. In the New Revised Standard Version (Catholic Edition) it is translated thus:

"And when you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by men. Truly, I say to you, they have their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, 18 that your fasting may not be seen by men but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

“Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

“The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is not sound, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!

“No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.

“Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor about your body, what you shall put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add one cubit to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O men of little faith?"

Maybe this seems like an odd passage to study at this moment, but maybe it isn't odd at all.

Jesus is not just commenting on fasting; He is commenting on putting on airs and displays in order to please and impress other people. Am I supposed to be persuaded to buy things because someone else has them, or in reaction to someone creating a need in my ego where no such need existed? Why lay up treasures that corrode?

Do I keep my focus on the light of love, or do I begin to believe love has to be earned? To believe love has to be earned is to focus on the shadow and the darkness.

Do I feel a need to stay in style? Who am I serving? God, or some designer?

Jesus, what happens if I let go of participating in a needs-based life? What will happen? How will I know that's OK to do?

And the answer comes to me not as a rebuke, but instead with the honeyed tones of a loving mother soothing an upset child: "Little one, do not be anxious about your life. Look what God does!"

My critical mind begins to argue against such simple faith. I formulate tremendously complicated, far-fetched arguments. "Who can trust God when a foster child was found murdered...?" Suddenly I have leapt from trusting God for my needs to challenging God's reliability.

I have leapt toward everything but faith.

There's the rub. In the end, it always comes round to this same discussion between God and me. It starts with the Super Bowl, or some other random topic, but if I chase it long enough, any dissatisfaction I feel ultimately runs down the path of Faith Discussions.

I want faith to satisfy me before I feel a need. God apparently wants me to have faith so I don't have to feel a need.

I can throw a child's murder at God like an accusation, but if I move from a place of faith, I only hear God saying, "What is yours to do in this situation? Who am I asking you to love, to console, to strengthen, to show compassion?"

If I let go of my needs, trust God is meeting them, and step out to meet some of the needs in my community, everything changes for me. Suddenly I have meaning.

And if I cannot find meaning anymore in a football game, it is not the fault of the game or the advertisers or the demographics of age and wealth and gender. It is just that I am being called to do something else at that moment, and will be dissatisfied until I respond to THAT call.

1500 years ago, St. Augustine of Hippo said, "Our hearts are restless, Lord, until they rest in thee."

And so it is.

Supporting Each Other

In our town, there is a high school P.E. coach named Paul who I have encountered on several occasions. The first time was earlier this summer when I met him and his adult son Jakob atop a steep hill in our area that is popular with runners and mountain bikers.

As the school year dawned, I saw him again regularly at a track where I go for training runs. He had his soccer team running drills there.

I don't know how many kids are on that team, maybe 20 or so. They come in all shapes, sizes, colors, and abilities. When they run laps, some finish far ahead of the others. Yet, as they finish they gather and call out encouragement to their teammates. "C'mon! You can do it! Great job! Way to go, man!"

Everyone on the team cheers until the last runner has finished his mile.

It's not that I would expect them to yell, "Move your butt, slow-poke!" but they could finish their mile and just talk to each other until the rest wrap it up. Instead, they stay involved with one another, lifting each one up, making sure everyone knows they are important to the team and worth cheering.

They are learning that cheering another person's success does not diminish their own.

What a valuable lesson to teach.

Way to go, Coach!

Pace e bene,
Fr. David+

My Name is David and I Am Needy

I am a needy man. I have moments of despair and doubt, loneliness and uncertainty, disappointment and pessimism. I need reassurance in those moments. Sometimes I can get it directly from God, feel the Presence, have a clear conversation with Jesus. Sometimes I get it indirectly, through a moving song, film, book, poem or even facebook post. Sometimes I get it personally, receive it from someone who loves me.

On my best days, I am still needy. What makes them my best days is that I recognize that fact and ask for what I need.

Maybe I'm setting the bar too low, but I anticipate I will always have one need or another. I live in a world made of human beings and temporal things. People are here for a season, not always available, passing on or away. Things last for awhile, then evaporate or wear out or become obsolete.

Don't get me wrong; there are a handful of people I trust completely, and others to whom I respond according to what they present. I'm not cursing my life in a temporal world, nor preaching that everyone is useless and going to hell in a hand-basket.

I'm just saying that sometimes I am needy and I reach out to these sources in order to satisfy my need.

I believe my neediness is what guides me to God. I am not self-sufficient, and how foolish it is when I think that I am. I needed parents and a heritage in order to get here in the first place. I needed care, food, direction, lessons, training. I did not teach myself to ride a bike the moment I popped out of the womb. People encouraged me to sit up, crawl, walk, run, and so on until I began experimenting with that daunting two-wheeler (four-wheeler if you count the training wheels!!).

Yes, my name is David and I am needy. My ultimate satisfaction will be my union with God. Every need I feel is a reminder and a signpost that leads me deeper and deeper into that union.

Tonight I had a brief encounter with a group of people who do not know they are needy. The claw and clamor for recognition, demand their superiority, and fight like the Gospel's "sons of thunder" for first place in a competition they believe leads only to first place or dead last.

Our false sense of independence is what throws us into these violent competitions. Ego wants a statue erected to it and the best seat at the dinner table.

Jesus doesn't support that attitude. He says to not take the seat of honor, but the lowliest one at the table. He says in order to be great in God's world, we are called to be servants, not slave-masters.

If we give up competition, what is left? Give up competition! How un-Western, let alone un-American!! What is left is cooperation governed by compassion. If we are busy serving each other, nobody needs to win because everyone will.

When we act as if we have no needs, we are dangerous to ourselves and others. We no longer see ourselves as human. How can we then relate to the humans around us?

No, my friend, I hate to disillusion you about priests, but I have to let you know this one is chock-full of needs. That is what opens me to love.

Thank You, God, for bringing me to the point of recognizing how wonderful it is to be needy.

Pace e bene,
Fr. David+

And the World Kept Turning

When I left the nursing home this morning after attending my friend's death, I drove to the running track where we train on Monday and Thursdays. I was dressed in what my friend jokingly calls my "priest tuxedo" - black slacks, sandals, and a shirt with a Roman collar. Not the usual wear for a training run.

I arrived about 7:30 a.m. and began to walk the track while awaiting my coach's arrival for our scheduled 8:00 a.m. training.

It was a grace to be in this familiar place doing this familiar thing, laps on the track, even though I was just walking. I didn't have to do anything but follow the lanes and just be. The similarity to a labyrinth was not lost one me. This, I thought, is my labyrinth.

The coach arrived and understood when I explained the events of my evening and my decision to go home and get a nap. We walked about a mile or so together, and somewhere along the way my sandal broke. When you wear out the sandals you generally wear when ministering, it's probably time to see how the rest of you is doing. After walking barefoot for about 1/4 of a mile, I headed home and he began his planned workout.

I took a nap, a wonderful, deep, out-like-a-light nap. When I woke, I felt better but not totally refreshed. In the past week, there have been a lot of extra activities, including visits to my dying friend. I have a busy life in general; this week has been more-so than usual. There is personal restoration to do.

I called the people I had scheduled for the afternoon, and asked if they would mind moving their appointments to tomorrow afternoon instead. They understood and accommodated the change. I cleared my evening, too, deciding just to take care of my needs today.

So I took a day off, and much to my ego's dismay, the world did not stop turning, the sun did not quit shining, and the Milky Way did not collapse upon itself into a giant black hole.

Tomorrow will be a busy day, and Saturday will be a busy day, and Sunday will be a busy day, and on and on. I'll be ready for them, because today I listened to my mind, my heart, my soul and my body. We can only give what we have to give.

Take care of yourself. When your shoes wear out, take a nap. The world will keep turning.

The song "Come with Me into the Fields" by Dan Schutte came to mind. It is based on Matthew 9:37. Let's close with his words instead of mine.

The fields are high and summer's days are few;
green fields have turned to gold.
The time is here for the harvesting,
for gathering home into barns.

The harvest is plenty; laborers are few.
Come with me into the fields.
Your arms may grow weary; your shoes will wear thin.
Come with me into the fields.

The seeds were sown by other hands than yours;
nurtured and cared for they grow.
But those who have sown will not harvest them;
the reaping will not be their care.

The harvest is plenty; laborers are few.
Come with me into the fields.
Your arms may grow weary; your shoes will wear thin.
Come with me into the fields.

pace e bene
David+

Farewell, Friend

A telephone call in the night. I headed to the nursing home, about 20 miles distant. My friend's condition had changed, and he was on his way home. I was grateful for their call, because I promised him I would be back in the morning. I just didn't realize how early in the morning that would turn out to be.

So I sat on the edge of the bed, holding his hand and occasionally stroking his forehead, letting him know I was there, God was there, and it was all right. He was resting peacefully. Somewhere around 6:30 this morning, he quietly passed on.

Witnessing his good and gentle death reminded me of the poem "Crossing the Bar" by Alfred Lord Tennyson:

Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crost the bar.

Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual Light shine upon him. May his soul and the souls of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace. Amen.

Pace e bene,
David+

Brief Moments in a Vast Eternity

This evening, I sat on the edge of a bed holding the hand of my dying friend. When I first arrived, he could not move his head enough to focus on me and see that I was there. The nurse wheeled his bed to an angle away from the wall so I could position myself in his line of sight. His eyes opened wide, and he said, "Where you been?" I told him I have been there every day, but he was asleep the last two times I visited. He closed his eyes and rested while I rubbed his forehead and reminded him about how much God loves him. I started to shift my position and he said, "Don't leave yet." I assured him I would remain. Now and then after that, he would try to speak, but he was tired and dealing with fluid building up, so his efforts were guttural at best. After about half-an-hour, he summoned his strength and clearly said, "My brother David." I told him he was right, that I am his brother. You might not see the family resemblance at first, if you are distracted by comparing the black man with the thick grey dreadlocks to the mostly bald white man with the sparse, short grey hair. But, that same distraction gets in the way for all of us. We don't see the family resemblance we share as the family of humankind. That's all right; all that mattered tonight was that the two of us saw it. We didn't know each other before the hospital called me a week ago in response to his request to talk and pray with someone. But, to paraphrase an Eva Cassidy song, "we know each other now by heart." He probably has a couple of days left, according to the experts. Maybe more; who can say? The educated guess is two. The nursing home knows to call me if there are any significant changes before I see him tomorrow. Before too long, there will be a tomorrow when I won't see him anymore. Tonight, I held his hand, leaned in, and sang him the song, "All Through the Night," a lullaby from Peter, Paul and Mary's "Peter, Paul and Mommy" album of children's music. I reminded him that he is a beloved child of God, kissed him on the forehead, and quietly left the room as he drifted into sleep.

The Illusion of Final

I had a tough training run today. The first three or four miles were all right, but after that, I was struggling. I've run the distance and the terrain before, but you would never know that from today's experience. In fact, I've often run further. I was slightly over eight miles into my 10 mile run when I began to weave back and forth and realized I was "bonking." I didn't have the reserves to continue. I felt physically spent. I sat down, exhausted. My running partner Warren was having a strong day, and was well up the final hill when I sat at the foot of it. My other running partner Jessi came back to where I was and asked if I was all right. I said I was; I just had bonked and felt wasted. She said, "Are you sure? You're almost there." I asked for help standing up, and made my way to a nearby bench in the shade. I knew I would be OK, and encouraged her to finish her run. She left and I recovered in the shade for a few minutes with her question echoing in my head. Am I sure I'm finished? Am I OK with stopping this close to my goal? Am I sure I'm finished? Did I really want to end this run at this point? Am I sure I'm finished? As I regained my strength, I realized the answer was, "No. I'm not finished. I only have a mile and three-quarters left. I don't need to run it at top speed, but I need to finish it because I can." I dialed Warren on my cell phone to let him know of my decision and the route I would be taking. I topped the hill and a little at a time began to run toward my goal. No one would have mistaken me for Usain Bolt during that last segment. My best pace was a lively jog. But it was not my intention to set a speed record. It was my intention to finish. Warren and Jessi doubled back and ran with me while I finished the last mile. I told Jessi that it was her comment, "Are you sure? You're almost there," that made the difference. As teammates, we encourage each other and affirm each other's success. I knew I was supported 100% whether I continued or stopped short. I also knew if I could finish, I must finish. This is not some macho code of honor; this is simply having integrity and learning what the day and the trail want to teach. I have learned over the past 10 months of endurance running training that I have not come close to completely tapping my reserves. I have learned more and more that I have reserves to tap. I have learned that I am loved and supported, not just by my friends, but by strangers in the running community who call out encouragement as they pass. At the end of the run, I had gone 10.25 miles before I switched off my performance tracker. After that, I probably walked another 1/3 of a mile. What mattered was not that I did not do so well as a trail runner, or that I had to regroup a couple of times physically along the way. What mattered was that when I was almost there, and no one was going to judge me for the decision I made, the only decision I could make was to finish. Today, I learned there is a difference between giving all and giving up.

The Power of Will

The popular belief is that we only use 10% of our brain. I have heard this is a misconception; actually the other 90% is used for processing functions. Either way, there is always more "brain power" available. As an endurance runner, I am learning about the power of will. My training today involved running a mile uphill at a sustained high heart rate (between 140-155 bpm; my resting pulse is 51, and my comfortable running zone is 130-135). Occasionally it would fall to 139 or 138, and I had to push as much psychologically as physically to force it back up into the 140+ range. Bodies in motion do not necessarily want to stay in motion! When I am feeling spent, it is hard to summon the will to hit the accelerator. However, that is when I begin to appreciate how powerful the will is. I am exercising it as much as my legs and lungs and heart. I can be stubborn, but not necessarily strong-willed. Now I am learning how to be strong-willed. The will is powerful, and I suspect employing even 10% would be amazing. Nothing I have done in my life has taught me about the will quite like endurance running. At first the only will that seemed related to endurance running was the one dividing my estate, because on some of those initial double-digit training runs, I was pretty sure I needed to keep it up-to-date! Now the other will is involved, the force within. And yes, my heart rate averaged 142 on that uphill run. That's the power of will.

Soft Souls and Nomads

I'll call him Curtis. He's the patient the hospital called me to visit on Sunday. That was the day he asked for someone with whom he could talk and pray. He felt alone, estranged from his son and daughter and separated from his brother and sister who had their own lives. We talked, we prayed, and the next day when I went to visit him, he was smiling. He had received calls from his brother, his sister, his son and his daughter. Today he was transferred to a nursing home. It is expected he will be there until the end of his journey and it is expected that won't be too far in the future. He just says, "God knows." I went to visit him in the nursing home, two towns away, in another county. I arrived late in the evening, "playing the clergy card" to get in after-hours. The staff knew I was on my way. "Curtis" greeted me with a deep hug. He told me his daughter and four granddaughters had come to see him that afternoon. Thank You for listening, God. He talked with his brother and sister. Their lives are different from his. They have expensive homes and comfortable lives, things that were never part of his experience. "Some souls are nomads," I said, "journeying through this life. Nomads see things that city-dwellers will never understand." He looks like a nomad, and he seemed to relate to the idea. I told him about a parish where i did mission work once in the Dominican Republic, Jesus Pellegrino. "Jesus the Pilgrim." Curtis strikes me as a pilgrim on this journey. I think that accounts for his deep love of spirituals and old hymns. He told me it wasn't his work to be like his brother and sister. It was his work to be a "soft soul," the one that ministers to others. I loved that description. Lord, teach me too to be a soft soul on this pilgrimage!

Necessary Grace and the Meaning of a Single Day

In the middle of a busy afternoon, the cell phone rang. "This is the hospital calling and we have a patient who would like to see a minister..." I am one of the overnight and weekend ministers on call, so I shifted my day and headed to the hospital. Who am I to know what to say to a stranger on a hospital bed? What words can I offer to a family whose loved one just died? The hospital doesn't call me for people who can wait for the day chaplain. I don't often know how I will be called upon to serve; this leaves plenty of room to depend not only on grace but on necessary grace. I stopped at the nurse's station to check on the patient, but his nurse was on her rounds and the man at the desk could offer no information. After a short walk to the room and a knock on the open door, I met the patient. He was an older man, although I could not tell if he was all that much older than me. Heavy, restless, and uncomfortable with a mass of grey dreadlocks and piercing brown eyes, he looked up at me and said, "I'm going through some stuff." Medication and weariness interrupted his thoughts from time to time so that constructing a sentence ebbed and flowed like trying to start a car motor on a cold winter day. Sadness, regret and doubt clouded his words. Relationships had fallen away; expectations were unmet; potential was unrealized. Jobs came and went, some good, some not so good. He was a talented photographer in the 35mm film days; his illiteracy never allowed him the chance to catch up. He had never become the man his mother envisioned, never felt able to fill his father's shoes, lost touch with his children, and was estranged from his brother and sister. This was his life: alone for three weeks in a hospital bed, with one visitor other than me in all of that time. His next home would be a brief stay at a hospice facility. Lacking a heart transplant, there was no other prognosis and the one he had was short-term. He did not look at his life and ask me, "Is God punishing me? Does God not like me?" He only asked, "How can I know I'm all right with God? I have failed at many things." I quoted Psalm 51:17 to him. "My sacrifice is a contrite spirit; my humbled heart You will not spurn." I assured him that the moment we ask, "Am I all right with God?" God rushes to answer, "Yes, and how I love you!" It is not in our achievements that God delights, although we feverishly continue to build our personal Towers of Babel as though they make a difference in eternity. It is in our hearts that God delights, in hearts turned toward God, in hearts that ache and long to feel connected with God. God does not need us to have a perfect heart, only a humble one, only one that needs God and knows it. He was tired, so I excused myself and told him I will see him tomorrow. Tomorrow? Tomorrow, he will be taken off of an IV medication and switched to oral prescriptions. This will increase the likelihood that the hospital will be able to find an "end-of-life care placement" for him. I asked the nurse to include a staff note to let me know the next facility to which he goes so that I can be a friend to this man who could use one. Tomorrow may or may not find him still here. He does not seem to have many tomorrows left. But he had today, and today we talked, and he cried, and he told the nurse it helped. Today he had the opportunity to hear that God loves him, loves him deeply and fully as if he were God's only child. God forgives him. God is always offering a new start to him. I hope he'll be around for me to see him tomorrow. We were a somewhat unlikely pair to find common ground, but faith, hope and love make up some powerful common ground. Today, I could offer him all three. A time will come when faith will be rewarded and hope will be fulfilled, and only love will remain. Forever. Not regret, not sadness, not doubt. Pure love. Necessary grace.

So Many Lessons

So yesterday during my long run, I "bonked." This is when a runner physically runs out of reserves. Like a car running out of gas, just past mile 12 I began to sputter on my way to a stop. I didn't meet my expectation to run 17 miles, and I couldn't keep up with my friends who ran the rest of the remaining 5 miles. Of course, that parental loop was running through my head: "Don't be a quitter!" "Why can't you be like your friends?" Among other messages.

Did it matter that December 1, 2011, I had not run for 30 years, and here I was on March 17, 2012 churning out miles? No. Of course not. Ego says it's black or white, finish or don't finish. Just do it! Not try, do!

Maybe Yoda and Mr. Miyagi are not always right.

Wow! That feels blasphemous to say. Or maybe we need to keep it in context.

There is a wonderful line in the movie Top Gun: "Your ego is writing checks your body can't cash." I never really understood that line until I began running again. Now it's beginning to sink in.

I laughed with four friends tonight as I described my journey from bonk to blessing. There are so many gifts that have emerged that I know I am yet to find them all.

I thought of the recent hospital visits I had made as a priest, called in to somehow say the right thing to strangers who had emotionally and spiritually bonked because of their own or a loved one's illness, or a sudden death in the family. God's little reminder: "Remember, Fr. David, that this is what it feels like to run out of reserves."

I thought about what it means to be a disciple. It means to follow a discipline. In the Gospel according to Mark, chapter 9, verses 14-29, there is a story of a possessed boy who is brought to Jesus to be delivered from a demon. Jesus casts out the demon, healing the boy. His disciples go to Jesus privately, and ask, "Why couldn't we do that?" You see, just a bit earlier in chapter 6, Jesus had sent the disciples out two by two, and gave them authority over unclean spirits. So, why is it just a page or two later that they fail at what He told them to do?
Jesus responds, "This kind can only come out by prayer." Some manuscripts read, "...by prayer and fasting."

Jesus was telling His disciples they couldn't do it because they were not prepared for what was required to do it. Their earlier successes gave them confidence, but confidence alone is not sufficient.

To be a disciple is to follow a discipline. And in running, the disciple would ask, "Why couldn't I do that?" And the Coach may respond, "This distance requires patience and pacing."

Whatever the answer, the wise choice is to listen to it rather than to keep repeating the question to myself. For 28 hours. Nonstop.

Some people question Jesus' humanity and some His divinity. I believe without doubt that Jesus is fully human and fully divine. My problem is that sometimes I forget I am fully human. I expect to function in the realm of the divine, and while I am always in the presence of God, I do God a disservice when I ignore my humanity. It is a gift given to my soul.

One of my theological heroes, Fr. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, wrote about the divinization of our diminishment. My simple application of his profound thought is that when we crack, when something gives and our ego develops a splintering gap, we have an opportunity for God to be allowed to enter more deeply into our consciousness and fill that part with divinity where before we had filled it with, or more accurately, buried it beneath, our ego.

Thus, when we are diminished, we are in a deep state of blessing. Those painful fissures are open doors through which we can choose to admit God. They are opportunities to abandon the artificial loneliness in which we choose to live, and instead live in The Divine Milieu. Simply put, to abandon our lonely estate in favor of living in a state of grace.

So I didn't run for 17 miles in a row. My coach told me "the day delivered to me what it was supposed to." Apparently it was supposed to deliver by the truckload, and it's all good.

Human after all

This humanity thing is not always simple. Or fun.

Today, I joined my team for a training run of 17 miles. However, I only made it for about 13 of them before I had to stop. Last week, on a 15 mile run, I made it to 11, then had to stop, but that time I was able to continue and finish the distance. Not today.

Yesterday was a difficult day for me, and it made today's results feel like a failure. I could have used some success today, but apparently God didn't get that memo.

I left the training session feeling very down about what happened.

You see, I felt like I had lost hope. I had hoped I would not encounter a day like yesterday, but I did. I had hoped I would finish 17 miles and be celebrating it, but I didn't. And I hoped this week's run would redeem last week's, but that was not the case.

I thought perhaps a nap would refresh my body and spirit, but I laid awake, physically sore and emotionally uncomfortable.

The phone rang. It was a friend of mine who was excited by some news she got. An unexpected, slim possibility had come to pass and her faith was rewarded right when things looked the darkest for her in a very difficult situation.

I went out to my car with a Sharpie permanent marker. On the back of my car is a "13.1" sticker marking the first day I ran a half-marathon (13.1 miles). Underneath the numbers, I printed the words "and counting."

Hope is an elusive thing, sometimes. I'm disappointed and embarrassed that I could not go the distance my friends were able to go. It will probably still take some more time to work through those feelings. They seem to be running deep. But, some wee, defiant part of me has begun to rise up, some part willing to add that "and counting," some part that refuses not to believe no matter how the rest of me feels.

Though it may be in the minority at this moment, I am grateful for that wee, defiant part. It is the spark of hope.

Living the Creative Life

We are wonderfully and awesomely made in the image and likeness of God, according to Scripture. No where is that more clearly evidenced than in the natural creativity of human beings.

While God originated the sunset, artists reinterpret it; songwriters use it metaphorically; westerns use it to represent the end of the story, and so on.

God invites us to create together, and those who respond with "Yes!" begin adventures that change their lives and the lives of others for the better. Some become well-known, others remain anonymous, but their influence is felt in both cases.

You and I are invited to co-create our lives with God. Because we have free will, we can choose to co-create without God, but no one creates alone. We are all influenced by some source, perhaps the opinions of our parents, or the perspectives of our friends, or the influence of unexamined feelings, or the stimulus of chemicals, or the directions of a person we have positioned as our superior.

In other words, if we don't choose to co-create with God, our life will be co-created by someone else. If we don't understand our role is to participate in that creation, then we will wind up living someone else's life as our own.

I prefer to co-create with God. That sounds idealistic and rosy, but it means there are times when we (God and I) have to dismantle the work others have done in my life, and rebuild according to the original blueprints, not by the shortcuts or alterations someone else created.

Simply put, it requires work and dedication and willingness. When I discover I am not on-track, I need to notice it and get back on-track.

If I see this effort as a part-time job, and I only work with God when I punch the clock and then leave God's influence behind at the end of my work day, it will take a lot longer to get things done. On the other hand, if I pray and meditate and stay centered on God, it is much easier.

In my training as an endurance athlete learning how to run long distances, my focus is on a variety of checkpoints. How is my posture? How is my stride? How is my foot strike? Are my shoulders relaxed? Are my IT bands flexible? Am I breathing well? Am I leaning into the hills? Am I letting myself recover on the downhill runs? The more I pay attention to these things, the better and farther I can run. I learned them from the Coach who is helping to co-create me as a runner. From spending time with him, the lessons become intuitive. To those around me, I look like a runner now.

Likewise, from spending time with God, the lessons become intuitive. As I internalize the guidance and directions that God gives me, I look more and more to those around me like someone who is co-creating a life with God.

How is my posture? Is it humble and grateful? How is my stride? Is it joyous and confident? How is my foot strike? Is it sure and directed? Are my shoulders relaxed, or am I too preoccupied with carrying my burdens and not giving them to God? Are my IT bands flexible? Am I ready to go in the direction I am told? Am I breathing well? Am I inhaling Spirit and allowing it to generate life within me? Am I leaning into the hills? Am I willing to take on the parts of this road that climb and offer challenges? Am I letting myself recover on the downhill runs? Am I laughing with God and offering praise?

Someone or something is going to co-create your life with you. Will it be God?

Crucifixion and Resurrection

The past week has been challenging on every level. It culminated Friday night in a 10:00 p.m. trip to the emergency veterinary clinic with my beloved cat, where she was left overnight with an uncertain fate, and then a 3:00 a.m. call to the hospital to comfort a family dealing with an unexpected death.

After that, I drove down to the clinic where the cat was improved somewhat, then went home and grabbed two hours of sleep before rising to join my marathon team on a 15-mile training run over hills and trails.

I started strong, keeping up with the better runners on our team for the first five miles, which is a big improvement for me. I knew eventually they would pull away. About 10 or 11 miles into the run, I ran out of steam. I was dizzy, wobbling, and thoroughly exhausted, facing the main hill climb for the second loop and feeling 100% empty and hollow.

Our assistant coach came down the hill toward me, like an angel descending, and asked how I was doing. We went through the checklist. Pain? No. Exhaustion? Yes. She suggested I call it a day, since the coaches knew I was beginning already depleted from lack of sleep. I asked if it was all right for me to just sit down for a minute, and she said yes. I was an emotional wreck.

I sat on the grass beside the trail. It was the softest, coolest grass I have ever felt. She sat beside me, helping me think things through.

Our coach came up at that point and asked what was happening, and he agreed with her assessment that I call it a day. After a bit, I stood up and looked at Coach and tried to say, "I don't want to fail." However, I only got the "I don't" part out before I was wracked with tears, and for about two minutes I sobbed like a baby while they hugged and supported me.

And then it was done. The tears had passed. I stood erect, and it was as if someone had poured strength into me. The assistant coach said I looked a lot better. I said to her, "Let's conquer this hill."

They allowed me to continue, and continue I did. After some distance, they had me check-in again. We were at a point where I could pack it in, or finish the last four or so miles. I said I would obey their direction, but I wanted to finish the distance.

After a little more examination, they gave me the permission to finish and Coach ran beside me, allowing me to set the pace. In a mix of running, jogging and walking, I completed the 15 miles.

As I did, I noticed the depth of the blue sky, the intensity of the green hills, the song of the waves of the lake lapping at the shore, all as if I were seeing it for the first time.

Somewhere around mile 10 or 11, a part of me died and a new part rose up, more alive than I have ever felt in my life. Completely alive.

When I arrived to run this morning, our team chaplain said a prayer that included a familiar passage from Isaiah 40:30-31: "But those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."

Sometimes we have to be willing to endure the crucifixion in order to understand resurrection. When we do, the LORD renews our strength. We run and not grow weary, and we walk and not be faint.

When All Else Fails

I spent some time at a hospital tonight at the bedside of a man who had no answers, only questions. Sometimes, there are no answers. But that does not mean there IS no answer. There is an answer, and it is love.

If we trust love, we have an answer.

I know it's very 1960's of me to say, "Love is the answer," but I have yet to find it isn't, so I'm sticking with it.

Just Like God's Own Lippizaner

Training for a marathon at age 56 after not running for thirty-odd years has turned out to be less daunting and more exciting than I imagined. Good coaching has been the key to joyful running.

Still, I managed to get a knot in my thigh muscle that sidelined me a bit, and it took massage, rest, and gentle, warmed-up stretches to work through it. I tried to run on Monday of this week, but it was too painful. Monday night I received the massage, and Tuesday and Wednesday I took it easy, just walking and nothing more.

Now, Thursday is here and I went to the track intending another day of walking while my teammates ran. Our long runs are on Saturday, and I wanted to be able to join them for that.

I walked about a mile and felt good, so I decided to try a light jog. I was fearful that the knot would return and decided the jog would help me overcome that fear. As I began to jog, I was joyful that no pain began. It was a beautiful morning and I felt like I was God’s Own Lippizaner Stallion, prancing. So after another 400 meters, I became God’s Own Trotting Lippizaner, and 400 meters later, God’s Own Running Lippizaner.

When I was a freshman in high school, back in the days of the dinosaurs, we had a nun who told us we were thoroughbreds who had tremendous potential, but that potential needed to be harnessed and directed.

I remembered that this morning as I harnessed and directed my inner Lipizzaner.

God has created a universe for my pleasure, filled with redwoods and stars and brooks and oceans and sunsets. Today I felt like I had the opportunity to offer God pleasure, to give God a show in a simple way that celebrated who I was created to be.

What a precious time that was when all else fell away, and in that whole universe there was only God and God’s Own Dancing Lippizaner.